Thursday, April 4, 2013

Las Grutas to Coronel Pringles

View Larger MapAfter packing up and getting everything loaded, I tried to find the
caretaker for the campground that I had crashed at in order to pay him. I spent
about 15 minutes wandering around the grounds looking for him, but was
ultimately unsuccessful. Eventually, I ended up just having to leave without
paying. Looks like another night of free
camping!The road was
more of nothing:There was really nothing to see. The roads were incredibly long,
straight, and flat. I ended up breaking the day up into 100 mile chunks and
stopping at gas stations to rest and refuel.
With my debit card number having been stolen the day before, I was now
forced to call the bank everytime that I wanted to use the card. Luckily, nearly
every gas station has wifi and I was able to use some skype credit to make cheap
international calls.I
passed throughout the town of Bahia Blanca. After having been in Patagonia for
so long, It was a little strange passing through a city with multi story
buildings.It was also a little strange to see a Wal-Mart alongside the
road:Leaving Bahia Blanca I soon began to enter into a more agrarian setting.
Lots of cattle pastures and crops. There was even a John Deere dealer. I felt
like I was back home!I made it to the small farming town of Coronel Pringles and pulled over
to see if I could find a place to camp. Luckily, it seems that nearly every town
in Argentina has a municipal campground where you can camp for free or at least
a very modest price. A local cop soon directed me to the town park where they
had a small spot for tents. As I pulled up, a few Argentinos walked up to me and began asking me
questions about me trip. They were really amazed that I had decided to visit
their small town and wanted to know why I had stopped there. I just told them
the truth: it was about a day's ride from where I had started in Las
Grutas.I eventually
set up camp, went for a little run, and then started cooking. While I was
cooking, I investigated one of the cracks that I had seen forming on my luggage
rack. It appeared that the crack had widened and had also broken through one of
the gussets that I had had welded onto the
outside.Luckily, there was a second gusset on the inside of the rack that was
keeping it from breaking off completely. I debated with myself on whether I
should try and ride it all the way into BA in the morning as it was, or try and
reinforce it. After a few glasses of wine, I decided I would figure it out in
the morning.